The First African American Presidential Secret Service Agent

www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk

Abraham Bolden was born into a poor family in East St. Louis, Illinois. After graduating from Lincoln University he spent four years as an Illinois State Trooper. His record was so outstanding that in 1959 President Dwight Eisenhower appointed him to the United States Secret Service. Based in Chicago, he won “two commendations for cracking counterfeiting rings”.

In 1961 President John F. Kennedy appointed Bolden as part of the Secret Service White House detail. According to Jim Marrs (Crossfire: The Plt That Killed Kennedy), Bolden was personally selected by Kennedy “in an attempt to integrate the previously all-white Secret Service detail”.

Bolden spent only three months working for Kennedy. He complained about the “separate housing facilities for black agents on southern trips”. At a meeting with James J. Rowley, the head of the Secret Service, Bolden criticized the “general laxity and the heavy drinking among the agents who were assigned to protect the President”. As a result of these complaints, Bolden was sent back to the Chicago office and assigned to routine anti-counterfeiting duties.

Bolden claimed that in October, 1963, the Chicago Secret Service office received a teletype from the Federal Bureau of Investigation warning that an attempt would be made to kill President John F. Kennedy by a four-man Cuban hit squad when he visited the city on 2nd November. Armed with high-powered rifles, the men from “a dissident Cuban group”. According to investigative journalist Edwin Black, the Secret Service arrested two suspects, however, they were eventually released.

Abraham Bolden later discovered that this information was being kept from the Warren Commission. When he complained about this he was warned “to keep his mouth shut”. Bolden decided to travel to

Washington where he telephoned Warren Commission Counsel J. Lee Rankin. Bolden was arrested and taken back to Chicago where he was charged with discussing a bribe with two known counterfeiters. He was eventually found guilty of accepting a bribe and spent six years in prison. When he tried to draw attention to his case, he was placed in solitary confinement.

Sam DeStefano, one of the men who accused Bolden of this crime, was murdered in 1973. DeStefano was close to Sam Giancana, Charles Nicoletti and Richard Cain. It is believed that Cain murdered DeStefano. Soon afterwards, Cain himself was murdered.

Lamar Waldron claims in his book, Ultimate Sacrifice, that according to a Central Intelligence Agency memo, mobsters in Chicago were involved in framing Bolden on the bribery charges.

In 2008 Abraham Bolden published his book, The Echo from Dealey Plaza, an account of his time as a member of the White House Secret Service.

source:www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk

Reuters – Oct 6, 2009
New Research to be Presented at JFK Assassination Conference
Partial list of presenting researchers and authors Abraham Bolden will reveal his personal story as the first African American to join the White House … read more

1929 --

Albertina Walker was born in Chicago, Illinois. By the age of four she had begun singing in the Children’s Choir of West Point Baptist Church. By the age of 14, Albertina Walker was a member of the Williams Singers and also toured with the Willie Webb and Robert Anderson Singers. By the age of 22 she formed her own group, the Caravans, which helped launch the careers of Evangelist Dorothy Norwood, Inez Andrews, Shirley Caesar, Delores Washington, Cassieta George, and Reverend James Cleveland.

In 1975 Albertina Walker recorded her first solo album, Put A Little Love In Your Heart. By 1999 she had recorded over sixty albums, solo and with other artists.

Albertina Walker, being committed to the preservation of gospel music, founded the Albertina Walker Foundation for the Creative and Performing Arts in1998. The foundation offers financial assistance in the form of scholarships to college students who plan on working with gospel music.

Albertina Walker is the recipient of many awards and honors, including: a 1995 Grammy Award for Best Traditional Album (Songs Of The Church); two Stellar awards; and several Gospel Music Workshop of America Excellence awards.

In 1994, Albertina Walker was honored at the Chicago Gospel Festival with a street being renamed in her honor, and the placement of a bench bearing her name in Chicago’s Grant Park. In 1997, she was conferred an Honorary Doctor of Letters degree by the Chicago Theological Seminary, an institution of the University of Chicago.

THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE NINETY-FIRST GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, issued House Bill. In the form of a resolution, congratulating Albertina Walker on the occasion of her 70th birthday and honoring her career accomplishments as a gospel musician. The bill was filed with the clerk on August 23, 1999 and officially adopted November 18, 1999.

source:www.artistdirect.com

Bright Hope Church in Philadelphia Puts all its Money in Black-owned Bank
Business and city leaders gathered in Progress Plaza to hail an investment by one of the city’s prominent black churches in a black-owned bank that serves North Philadelphia and other parts of the city.

read

Two Maryland men are being sought in connection with a scheme that bilked 21 black churches across Michigan out of $660000. Churches in Detroit, Flint, Saginaw, Inkster, Ferndale, Highland Park, Port Huron and Ypsilanti were scammed.

full story